


Pink was a Boy's Color

by MONANIK



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Kageyama Tobio, Bisexual Kageyama Tobio, Coming Out, Coming of Age, Crossdressing, Eventual Happy Ending, Harem sort of, Heartbreak, Hinata Shouyou & Kageyama Tobio Friendship, Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Kageyama Tobio-centric, M/M, Minor Violence, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Personal Growth, Pro Volleyball Player Kageyama Tobio, Rape/Non-con Elements, Self-Acceptance, Self-Discovery, Transphobia, Trauma, Typical shitty society stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 00:20:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29501220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MONANIK/pseuds/MONANIK
Summary: Kageyama Tobio likes skirts and makeup, but the rest of society doesn't really like him.Maybe the boys under his skirt--someday, somehow--will like him at least.Maybe if he only lets them in.The third surprise came one day after practice, when Tsukishima and him were the only two remaining in the changing room. Tobio was putting on a bra, his skirt swaying with his every movement--his struggling attempts to latch it across a wide back--and Tsukishima was watching him. Tobio could tell, because his gaze burned up his spine and down his legs, but he said nothing because he knew Tsukishima thought he hadn’t noticed.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio, Kageyama Tobio & Everyone, Kageyama Tobio/Miya Atsumu, Kageyama Tobio/Oikawa Tooru, Kageyama Tobio/Tsukishima Kei, Kageyama Tobio/Ushijima Wakatoshi
Comments: 15
Kudos: 114





	1. Branding

**Author's Note:**

> Woah!  
> Niko is back at it again with angst!
> 
> But wait!! I promise it'll end well ;) What's a rainbow without a little rain?
> 
> Heads up! This fic will deal with a plethora of very serious and very heavy topics. A lot of this is based either entirely or vaguely on my own experiences, so please don't needlessly attack me if you personally can't relate. All our stories are different.
> 
> Anyways, like I said, there will be dark shit here. I'm gonna keep it as non-explicit as possible but it will still /be there/ so proceed with caution. 
> 
> Have fun!

_What will you do when the vultures come for you?_

_Will you run and hide?_

_-_

“ _Can’t you just be normal?”_

Every night her voice echoed in his ears. Like a broken record he couldn’t remove, or even break; it kept spinning around in circles until it drove him out of bed and to the kitchen sink. A splash of water would do him good. That would pull him back down.

At night, when the town was asleep and even the annoying birds had ceased their singing, his house sits hidden in darkness. The hallways that stretch on into the void are cold and empty, and the only sound to Tobio’s socked footsteps is the ticking of the clock in the living room, somewhere in the corner, where the moonlight doesn’t reach.

When the faint light peeks through the clouds curtaining its light, it casts ice-cold beams of faint light on the empty living room, and in that light Tobio could see the dust swirling gently in the ventilation. He felt sick.

His body was tired, his mind stuck on a loop, and the condensation of the glass wasn’t pleasant at all. He’d forgotten to pat it dry before drinking, and now the lukewarm droplets were running down his wrist. He wanted to throw up.

He hadn’t seen his mother for a long time. Her and his father were both preoccupied with whatever it was that meant more to them than their teenage son. They hadn’t been there throughout his childhood, and they wouldn’t be there in the future either. The absence was the same, only this time there were no rough palms to strike his skin or flaming eyes to bore into his head; scrutinize every thought and every desire, waiting for a failure they were always expecting to be met with.

On the couch in the living room his jersey lay thrown on top, next to the skirt he’d almost been angry enough to wear to school. It hadn’t been easy, to ask Miwa for her old uniform, but in the end it had made him happy. In his room, where no one else was looking, where no one was searching for his imperfections, he could put it on, and feel at home in something for the first time. A million miles away from comfort he’d found the one thing that brought him joy. Miwa hadn’t been the same since then, and when they lost contact post her graduation—when she moved cities away from him—he hadn’t been surprised. It hadn’t come as a shock.

Eventually, everyone grew repulsed enough to leave. He’d long since accepted that reality.

He put the glass back in the sink, wiped his hands, and quietly dragged his way back to his bed. He laid there, for hours and hours, without getting so much as a single wink of sleep. This pattern, this endless restlessness, this torturous appetite for time, was a recent problem.

He’d never been good at sleeping, but at least back then, when the house wasn’t void of human touch, it had come easier. Back then, before Karasuno, before Kitagawa, everything had been so much easier.

Before Oikawa, before Hinata, before everything and everyone, he used to sleep through the nights.

-

_I couldn’t be anything that I didn’t wanna be_

_it’s stubborn as hell or a problem with authority_

‘ _Cause it won’t mirror your image of masculinity_

_Did I disappoint ya?_

_So I have to kill myself to be original?_

_And if I fucking hate you all am I a criminal?_

-

_He was lanky, back then. Tall, towering, and a little intimidating even to Tobio. His skin was always spotless, his hair always perfect, and his smiles never directed his way._

_Oikawa Tooru had his bits and pieces connected into a structure so immovable, so untouchable, it left everyone else in its shadow. Tobio had been the only one who’d tried to break through, to walk around, to_ _stride in through the front door_ _—and yet no matter how hard he tried he never succeeded. Oikawa Tooru was immovable not because he was stubborn, or ambitious, but because he wasn’t. Because he was as broken and haphazardly glued together as the rest of_ _them_ _._

_It had started after practice one day. Tobio had developed a habit of leaving last so he could avoid prying eyes and snide remarks; grabby hands reaching for his skin, thinking they had permission to trespass the hemlines of his skirts._

_He was in the locker room, confident he was the only one there, singing his heart out. Twirling and swaying his hips gently to the beat of the song. Enjoying the swish of air against bare thighs, and the feel of lace over his skin. He stood in front of the large mirror, brushing on a layer of glittery red over pink lips. Uncaring. Naked to the world, and naked to Oikawa Tooru, who’d ran back to the locker room for his forgotten phone._

_When the door opened, they both stared. Tobio, at his senpai’s shocked, flustered expression in the mirror, and Oikawa, at his kouhai’s long, long legs. Naked and moisturized and mouth watering._

_From that day onward their relationship changed. Every evening, after practice, Oikawa would linger a little longer. Choose the locker a little closer to Tobio. Every evening, after practice, Tobio would go home with bruised knees, and when his parents asked he’d tell them he’d injured himself during receives. They didn’t ask for the details, and neither did Tobio. All he knew was that Oikawa liked that part of him. Like it enough to leave bite marks on the top of his thighs, liked it enough to tentatively, shyly ask Tobio if he would fuck him with the skirt on. Liked it enough to kiss the palm of his hand when Tobio pressed his foot_ _over_ _the bulge in his shorts._

 _Oikawa looked as broken as the rest of them when he was sat there, on his knees, looking like Tobio had plucked the stars from the sky for him. It was a rush unlike anything else. It lit a fire within him, created a desire, a flame he would never be able to extinguish. The rush of breaking apart a man who took so much pride in being unbreakable was heady, the most_ _appetizing_ _rush, but when they were back on court, and Tobio into his ill-fitting jersey, the link between them broke. Every day it broke, and every night it merged. Over and over, on an endless loop, Tobio melted metal for him, and over and over, time and time again, a year later, that metallic chain lost its luster, and the place where they’d merged over and over had grown lumpy and ugly._

_-_

_I’ve been drunk for three years and fifteen days_

_of that perfume that you wear and that good look on your face_

_I ignored all my worst fears, and now this liquor won’t chase the thought of you from my brain_

_my mouth still stings from the taste of it_

_I don’t know why I’m still crying, it’s not like you’re wide awake_

_Why am I tossing back whiskey?_

_I should be popping champagne_

_-_

The Karasuno girls’ uniform was a plain black. Dark gray, if you were to ask Tobio, because in contrast with the ink of his hair it truly looked lackluster. A weak attempt at black. Worn to the bone as it were, probably.

What he hadn’t accounted for when he’d asked for Miwa’s skirt, back when she’d still been there, had been the sheer size difference they had and would develop once Tobio hit puberty properly. Now the skirt that once fit fairly well was so short he itched to stretch the hem down and keep pulling on it for every step he took.

He wasn’t ready. Wasn’t anywhere near ready to potentially jeopardize his entire high school carrier, but after so many sleepless nights he’d come to the conclusion that it was already as fucked as it would ever get. Once you hit rock bottom all there was left to do was to dig for diamonds, and his diamonds were his desire to be pretty. Sexy. Cute.

He was sick of handsome.

By the Karasuno gate, shielded from the incoming crowd of students by a single, strategically placed tree, stood Tobio. Mortified. He could feel the wind on his legs, and the moisturizer he’d put on his skin made the wind feel that much cooler. Goosebumps rose in its wake, and Tobio was a second away from running for his life, back to the safety of his room, when a voice behind him stopped him dead in his skin,

“K-kageyama…?”

He recognized that voice, of course he would. Half his days were spent listening to its screeching and shouting. Half his days were spent with that voice yelling or whispering or giggling excitedly in his ear.

“Shit.”

“Is that… really you?” Shoyou sounded tentative, hesitant. Tobio could hear the ruffle of dry leaves as he dragged just an inch closer.

“Yeah.”

“You’re… were you challenged by someone?” he brushed off with a chuckle, thinking he’d figured it out, but the nervous way in which his voice broke gave it all away.

Shoyou was _asking_ him if it was true, if the skirt was nothing more than a random challenge by a friend he knew Tobio didn’t have.

He dropped the death grip on his skirt when he turned. Shoyou looked confused, and yet high on his cheeks was the cutest blush Tobio had ever seen on him.

 _Now_ _that_ _was interesting._

“No, it’s not.”

“Then why—“

“Felt like it.”

He could feel every muscle in his face, tense as they were; was certain he was sporting a spectacular frown. He waited for laughter that never came, instead, Shoyou’s mouth opened and closed like a fish, until he finally nodded.

“Okay,” he said, “Why are you hiding, then?”

“I’m… scared… I guess…” he admitted, feeling heat flare up across his cheeks and ears. Shoyou scoffed.

“Scared? Kageyama Tobio is scared?” he asked, hands on his hips. He leaned in closer, then, and slowly rose a hand to tap the tips of his fingers against Tobio’s forehead. He was standing on his tip-toes, straining, and Tobio had to suppress the urge to scoop him into his arms. The urge to grin from ear to ear.

“D-do you have a feve—“ he started, but stopped himself—sniffed the air. “Are you… wearing perfume?” he asked.

“I always am,” Tobio replied.

Shoyou hummed, and stood back down on his feet. His ears were stoplight red as he walked by.

“Whatever, lets go!” he said, waving for Tobio to follow.

Maybe he only did because the pulsating, flaming red of Shoyou’s neck and ears was intriguing unlike anything else.

Curiosity, was how it had all started in the first place, after all.

-

_This whole thing started so that fathers could_

_sell daughters like property_

_But I never had a father and I_

_couldn’t be his daughter so look at me_

_-_

Karasuno the following days was pure chaos. The topic of the week had quickly become Tobio and his skirt, and the comments he faced on his walk of shame to class were crude and ill enough to make his skin crawl.

‘ _Faggot’, ‘Queer’, ‘Freak’._

But Tobio was used to it. Used to men old enough to be his father trailing touches down his back and up his legs, used to boys breaking his bones and his heart around their friends only to seek him out in quiet, desolate, dark hallways later; looking to try him out, to live out a fantasy with his body. Used to girls fawning over his skin, doing anything within their power to befriend him, to earn themselves a token GBF. Another accessory.

But one thing he wasn’t used to was the way Shoyou reacted to it with fury. The way Shoyou would fire back on every snide remark, every rude comment, and then yelp and hide behind Tobio when the others would swing their fists or spit out empty threats. He wasn’t used to being defended, and he hated it more than he thought he would.

Tobio didn’t need defending. Not from that.

When a group of delinquents caught him after class, behind the gym, it hadn’t taken much for the lot of them to run with their tails between their legs. The bruises, the cuts and the slaps, would heal. They always did. What mattered was that Tobio won, and he did every time, and as time went on the comments grew scarce, and again Tobio blended into the scenery.

What had hurt the most had been the team’s reaction. The way they cut their conversations with him short, the way Narita wouldn’t meet his eye, the way Tsukishima had another weakness of his to poke and prod until it was tender and blue.

Some reactions had been better than expected. Yachi had gently told him she thought the skirt suited him, and Daichi had assured him that he still had a place on the team. Suga had gone on a rant about how he knew _this one guy_ who really didn’t want to be a guy at all, and how he was planning surgery after high school. Tobio hadn’t had the heart, or energy, to correct him. To explain that she would and had always been a woman. He’d grown tired, in that single week, so he’d let it pass.

He shouldn’t have had, but he did. In the face of the herd he was powerless. King was only his title on court. On court where there were no expectations, no rules unrelated to volleyball. On the court where the only parts of him judged were all the bits and pieces he’d molded and shaped himself; all the bits he’d chosen to put on display.

The third surprise came one day after practice, when Tsukishima and him were the only two remaining in the changing room. Tobio was putting on a bra, his skirt swaying with his every movement-his struggling attempts to latch it across a wide back-and Tsukishima was watching him. Tobio could tell, because his gaze burned up his spine and down his legs, but he said nothing because he knew Tsukishima thought he hadn’t noticed.

So, he pretended he didn’t know, until Tsukishima slammed his locker a little harder than necessary. Tobio jumped.

“Is this just another elaborate joke or have you always been like this?” he asked.

Tobio wanted to ask _‘Like what?’,_ but instead he let his gaze drop to his socked feet. There were tiny, black cats printed on them. When he’d bought them he’d thought they were cute. Now he wanted to tear them off.

“Are you a tranny?” Tsukishima asked, a bite to his every syllable.

He stepped closer to Tobio and gripped his arm, hard.

“What, are you mute now?” he chuckled in that familiar, annoying tone of his. Tobio wanted the Earth to swallow him whole.

He squeezed his eyes shut, and clenched his fists.

“No. I just like it,” he gritted out.

Tsukishima hummed. The grip on his arm loosened and long, coarse fingers brushed up his arm, all the way to his shoulder where bruised knuckles crawled under his bra strap and pulled. It stung when it hit his skin, and Tobio hissed as Tsukishima crowded him further. He could feel the heat of him now, could see the specks of gold get swallowed by a black, hungry void.

“Are you a whore?” he asked, whispered.

Tobio shook his head. His heart was beating through his ears.

“No?” Tsukishima’s fingers slowly crept their way down towards Tobio’s chest, over the lace of his bralett, and fiddled there for a moment.

“How much for you to bend?” he asked, and Tobio gawked.

_Had he just—?_

“Did you just ask— Are you messing with me?!” He could feel it boiling in his gut: hot rage.

He pushed back into Tsukishima’s space, eyes flaring, “I’m not a whore, and I’d certainly never let _you_ fuck me!” he said.

And then, there, in those eyes, for a split second he saw the same temptation, the same desire he’d seen in Oikawa’s, but as soon as it’d arrived it was gone; replaced instead with something so dark, so malicious, it made him dizzy. He stumbled back, gasping, when those large hands grabbed onto his ass, underneath his skirt, and Tsukishima’s lips bit into his own.

He couldn’t yell, couldn’t do anything, because he knew in his gut that it wouldn’t end in his favor. So, he stood, and he went lax, and he kissed back.Tsukishima hummed, please, and Tobio wanted to throw up.

He couldn’t hit him. Couldn’t hurt him. He was scared, scared of what Tsukishima would do to him, to his reputation, if he did. In terms of physical strength the odds were all in Tobio’s favor. He was shorter, but wider. Bulkier. But this had long ago ceased to be a battle of strength. When it was about words, and people, Tobio was the first and most impressive loser.

So he yielded, and let him do whatever he wanted.

Tsukishima’s hands left marks wherever they went. They seared into his skin like a branding. Open wounds.

He wanted to scream, to run away, but the hands grabbing at every piece of skin they could find were immovable.

Tsukishima’s leg pressed between Tobio’s, and when he felt the other’s erection rubbing against his bare thigh he had to clench his jaw against the rush of disgust that flooded him. Teeth and lips and tongue dragged over his pulse point, and in the midst of it all, as Tsukishima’s hand crawled under his panties, Tobio’s whole world collapsed.

“Oh? I thought you wouldn’t bend for me?” he mocked, grabbing a fistful of Tobio’s erection. He cursed his body, cursed the jolts of pleasure and disgust running up his spine with every pull, every twist.

“I wouldn’t— This is not—“ he stuttered, but the hand in his underwear wouldn’t stop.

“Your body says otherwise,” the middle blocker whispered into his skin.

And later, as they were cleaning up, Tobio stood in silence. Asking himself, over and over again, why he’d allowed it.

Tsukishima seemed no different; still wearing the same, indifferent expression. As he was leaving he turned to Tobio, who was still standing there, shirt in hand, and said,

“This stays between you and me, got it?”

And Tobio nodded.

-

_No, I’m not bitter, I’m not mad_

_Well, maybe just a little, just a tad_

_I know every apple here ain’t bad,_

_but I found a worm in every single one I had_


	2. Hiding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tobio thought back to all the times they’d hooked up post practice, to the many hickeys he’d left on his skin, to the names and snarky comments.  
> To branding hands crawling under the hemline of his skirt.  
> “It does, but you’re my teammate. I can’t afford to get offended,” he said, after a while.  
> Tsukishima was silent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember to check the tags!
> 
> TW for mentions of self harm in various forms.

_I swallow my pride ‘cause I know what I gave_

_Why should I poison myself to try and fix your mistakes?_

-

Hinata’s lips were stretched thin, pink glistening with fluids. His cheeks were rosy, flushed from exertion and embarrassment, and from beneath long lashes brown eyes stared wide and curious at Tobio.

He, ironically, sucked at it.

Tobio yanked hard red hair that had grown long and unruly in their third year, detaching the flustered, panting middleblocker from his cock.

“Have you never done this before?” he asked.

Hinata huffed and attempted to frown at Tobio, but doing so while aroused and brushing precum off his lips meant the impact of it was lost entirely.

“Excuse me for never having sucked dick before,” he grumbled, his gaze glued to his own knees. Tobio let go of his hair and sat up properly.

“I can show you,” he said.

Hinata’s big brown eyes immediately shot up to Tobio’s face.

“Y-you’ve done this before…?” he asked, hesitantly.

“A few times, yeah.”

“To who?”

Hinata’s eyes were blown impossibly wide, and—his previous humiliation forgotten—had leaned over, so close to Tobio’s face he could smell the shampoo in his hair. In their third year Hinata had gotten his ear pierced. Now two golden rings decorated the length of one ear, and Tobio constantly caught his gaze  flicking over to its  golden  glimmer. 

“Does it matter?”

He sat back, then. Something in his expression crumbled, and a panic rose in Tobio. He had to fix the situation and he had to do it fast. 

“Do you want me to blow you or not?” he asked, feigning annoyance. 

It worked. Hinata nodded, shyly.

They readjusted their position on Hinata’s bed, Tobio now the one crawling over Hinata’s body to settle between already wide-spread legs. Eager, despite the confusion marring his features.

Tobio got to work and as he did allowed himself to leave his thoughts, emotions and worries behind. This was familiar territory. He knew bodies, especially male ones, and the things he knew the most he tended to enjoy. Right?  Right.

In their third year, sex had become an escape. He never told anyone, about what happened with him and Tsukishima, or about their changing relationship, and the bite marks and scratches he shrugged off as rough jogging terrain or intense practicing. No one ever questioned it. Perhaps because they already knew, or perhaps because they didn’t care. Tobio hated the first option but despised the second, so he pretended. Pretended he didn’t notice Yachi’s worried eyes. Ignored Suga’s  anxious texts. Shrugged off Yamaguchi’s attempt at getting closer. 

He couldn’t tell them. Not because he feared his reputation, or something equally as foolish, but simply because there was nothing to tell. Boys liked him and that was all there was to it, and if he looked into himself he would find that he liked boys, too. 

His and Hinata’s relationship had taken a turn sometime during their second year. One day, a seemingly mundane day, they’d been walking home after practice when his friend had, stuttering, invited him to his house.  _‘They’re all out of_ _town_ _this weekend’_ he’d told him. Tobio hadn’t had the heart to reject him. 

Hinata shone so bright. Under stadium lights, in the sun and moonlight, in the muddy flicker of a long-broken desk lamp that desperately needed its bulb replaced. He still remembered his annoyance with that Goddamn lamp, and he still remembered the untouched, unblemished cream of Hinata’s thighs. The softness of his belly. The gentle press of his arms wrapped tightly around Tobio. 

Who in their right mind would have said no?

-

_ S ee the thing about forever is that it’s a fucking lie _

_ But I’ll love you for tonight _

-

_ After he’d lost Kazuyo he’d turned to his senpai. One of those nights, when the ticking of the clock in the livingroom had grown too loud, he’d found his way to the front door of Oikawa’s apartment, dressed in the black leather skirt he knew he liked the most. He’d put on a pair of heels, had brushed his hair  back , and on his lips he’d stroked a thin layer of gloss, and yet his cheeks were covered in tear tracks. Striped lines, long and dry and ugly. They pulled at his skin and stung in the chill of the night.  _

_ Oikawa  had dragged him inside by the collar of his shirt, and when their lips crashed and merged his worries ebbed away. Like grains of sand they slipped between the cracks until the only evidence of them ever having been there was the drying, dirty feeling on his palms. Like he’d plunged his hands in dirt. _

_ That night, for the first time, Oikawa had been the one to spread long legs for him. _

_ A few weeks later the same hands that had crawled under his skin and wrapped like a vice around his heart had flung out to strike him. Their arrangement ended that day, and at graduation, when he watched his back leave the premises of the school grounds he would never return to, Tobio gave up on ever loving himself.  _

_ - _

_ I used to get in my feelings _

_ I would get stuck in my head _

_ Waiting for someone to hear me _

_ So naive, so innocent  _

_ Somehow I got it so twisted _

_ my world revolved around him _

_ Not anymore, I feel different _

_ nobody’s under my skin _

-

One day after practice, a mere weeks before their final day at Karasuno, Tsukishima sought him out by the wending machines. It was warm outside, pleasantly so, and a gentle breeze blew over his skin. In the shadows, where the sun didn’t reach, the air seemed a little bit lighter. 

“We need to talk,” he said. 

Tobio looked at him, really looked, and found to his astonishment that Tsukishima’s expression seemed heavier than usual. He wasn’t one to show remorse, so Tobio wouldn’t call it that, but it eerily reminded him of the same expression that had slipped Hinata’s face, all those nights ago.

“Then talk,” he replied, and watched Tsukishima’s eyebrow twitch ever so slightly. Still, he didn’t retort. Didn’t get angry. Tobio lowered his yogurt from where he’d been chewing on its straw nervously, waiting for what was to come.

Tsukishima took a deep breath, “Look, I want to apologize. For… you know…” He swung his hand s around in nervous circles, gesturing at something Tobio couldn’t see. He stopped when he got no response, and looked at Tobio for a long minute. Cicadas played their song in the distance, and from the football field he could make out the sound of cheering and laughter and all things  youth . 

“Don’t make me say it,” he said, but it sounded more like a plea. Quiet and broken. Tsukishima looked remorseful. 

“I don’t understand.”

Sunlight glimmered on  his glasses—sliver rimmed as they were—and Tobio’s gaze immediately flew to it. He wanted out of this conversation. 

Tsukishima gaped, “Are you serious? It  doesn’t bother you at all? What I did?” he asked. 

Tobio thought back to all the times they’d hooked up post practice, to the many hickeys he’d left on his skin, to the names and snarky comments. 

To branding hands crawling under the hemline of his skirt. 

“It does, but you’re my teammate. I can’t afford to get offended,” he said, after a while. 

Tsukishima was silent. 

“You’re not the first and you probably won’t be the last. If I spent valuable energy on constantly getting frustrated by all the wrongdoings people have put me through I’d be doing nothing but worry all the time. Eventually it gets tiring, so it’s easy to just ignore it.”

“You can’t be seriou— You should be yelling, shouting at me that I’m a jerk, not taking it lying down—!”

“You don’t get to tell me that!” he yelled, interrupting him mid-speech. Tsukishima flinched back. Tobio took a step closer. “After all the shit you put me through, you don’t get to tell me how to react! You don’t get to tell me how to feel! Why the fuck do you care, anyway? Aren’t I just your personal hole? A toy to fuck around with behind locked doors and in quiet corridors?” 

His chest heaved with every pained breath, and the yogurt packet had long  a go been squashed and thrown by their feet. His eyes burned. 

“What, you’re sorry? You want me to yell at you? Complain? Why? So you can feel well punished and justified?” He was crying now, gasping for breath, and his hands that had previously been shaking fists by his sides were gripping onto Tsukishima’s shirt as if his life depended on it.

“So you can walk away feeling better? I’ll be carrying this shit for the rest of my life! So guess what, asshole, you’re gonna be doing the same. I don’t care about your shitty feelings or your half-assed apologies. You can shove it all up your ass for all I care!”

He let go as if he’d been burned, and stepped away from Tsukishima’s pale complexion. 

“I’m not a punching bag.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

Silence.

“I’ll say this again,” he said, voice hushed and raspy in the cool breeze, “I don’t care about your shitty regret. I don’t need it. I’m fine. I will be even better.”

He frowned, and as his glasses  reflected the shine of the sun , he said, “I’m not asking for forgiveness, I’m not asking for a punishment, I’m asking you to care for yourself,” he said, sounding strained like Tobio had never heard him sound before, “Why won’t you fight? Aren’t you a fighter? The insufferable jerk that never gives up?”

Tobio’s fingers went numb. 

“Is this really right?”

“Since when do you—“

“Since I started giving a fucking shit, okay?!” 

Tsukishima’s cheeks took on a hue so rosy, so vulnerable, it made Tobio almost want to look away, but he didn’t. Against all instincts he kept his eyes glued to the glossy sheen in Tsukishima’s eyes. 

Throughout high school, him and Tsukishima never quite learned to tolerate each other. Whether it was on court or under the sheets, somehow biting remarks and ugly lies were the skeleton on which their relationship was built. They never learned to give in, to retreat, to draw back razor-sharp claws. They remained enemies for all their time there and now, by the vending machine outside, in the warm air and faint smell of spring, Tsukishima was retracting his claws. For the first time since they’d met he wasn’t throwing around insults or putting on a mask. Tsukishima was looking at him and seeing him, and if Tobio looked close enough he could perhaps see him, too.

“I never wanted to hate you,” he said, and Tobio’s heart crumbled to dust in his chest. The vulnerability in his voice, the warm spring breeze. 

“I was confused and angry, but I never meant to hate you. I’ve liked you since day one. I’ve been watching you since your Kitagawa days. I knew all about your hobby way before you started wearing it openly.”

Tobio gawked. He couldn’t believe his ears, was certain this was all an elaborate prank, but Tsukishima’s crumbled expression remained unchanged. If anything, he was growing desperate. The lines around his eyes, the bags underneath them, were stretched thin in budding panic. 

“I took it out on you because I’m a jerk. It’s easier to hate you, but I don’t. I never did. I thought you were foolish but brave. I liked the parts of you I despised the most because it frustrated me how easy being yourself came to you. Because you make the world turn _for you_. I envied it, and I envied the people around you, so I hurt you, because hurting you was easier.” 

And then, as the sun hid behind bright white clouds, Tsukishima Kei bowed to him.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and walked away.

But Tsukishima wouldn’t know. About the torture Tobio had been made to endure, the pain he’d been dealt, just to be who he was. Just to be allowed a walk in the park, with the spring breeze kissing his skin. Just to be allowed a frilly, thin skirt. 

He couldn’t know.

-

_I wish I could shelter the boy I knew_

_from the constant hell I put him through_

‘ _Cause I’m all grown up and I’m black and blue_

_I could use some tape, I could use some glue_

_-_

They parted ways after that. High school would mark the breaking point of their little friend group. Hinata flew off to the other side of the world, Tsukishima pursued a proper education like he’d always been made to do, Yachi became a little more daring than before and Tobio, well, he played volleyball. 

Back when he was still a kid he’d promised himself and the world that he would play for as long as his health allowed it. He would meet Hinata at the world stage even if he had to pay in blood for it. Call it desperation, if you please, but to Tobio it had become his comfort. The home he’d always longed for. On the court, no one underestimated him. On the court, no one patronized him. On the court,  _he_ ruled.

But his rule went further than that. After practices, and between games, he would rule where skin met skin in a sweaty, sticky dance. It had come as a surprise to him how many men were just like the ones he’d known in high school. Men who would seek comfort in his skirts and his touch, and men who were searching for a label in the cavity of  _his_ chest. Men who wanted to be dominated by someone they deemed less than them, weaker than them, were everywhere, and if Tobio were to be honest he knew deep down that he didn’t quite mind it as much as he should have had. It was exhilarating—being in charge. Deciding when and how to give pleasure to men who were all breathing their own delusion, thinking they were a step further up the stairs than Tobio. The reality was that they weren’t.

Each time, they all came back. Crawled their way to his feet. Underneath the moonlight they spoiled and cherished him, and in daylight they feared him. Tobio had the upper hand. They were all just pretending they didn’t know that. But they did. They were all painfully aware of the growing power imbalance. Because Tobio never allowed himself to care, never allowed his heart to so much as flinch for anyone else. It was foolish to think that any man would see him for what he was, beyond the skirts and lace, so he’d shut the door firmly. It left the men around him floundering, tripping all over themselves in vain attempts to grab his attention, to make him stay a little longer.

He prohibited kisses. Kisses were out of the question. Everything else was up for debate, but he would never kiss another. It was the key to the lock on his iron door. 

Hinata called him, one of those nights, after a particularly clingy teammate had taken an hour to let the notion of  _‘I’m not interested’_ sink into his head.

He told Tobio about Brazil, about the beaches and the sand and the volleyball he was learning. He complained about the heat, gushed about his room mate, and then told Tobio how he wasn’t straight, after all. About how he’d hooked up with a guy post game. About how amazing it had been. About how he might actually be a little bit in love.

And Tobio said nothing but his congratulations. He said nothing about how Tobio, too, was a man. Always had been; back then, too. 

He let it wash over him instead, and when he came home that night he took a lighter to the  faded black skirt  he’d tucked away in the back of his closet. 

The one that’d always been too small.

-

_ I’m back, I’m better _

_ I put that teddy bear you gave me in a blender _

-

By the time he’d gotten familiar with the rest of the Adlers, him and Ushijima had already grown closer than he’d ever expected them to. It was something with the way he never talked too much, never asked personal questions or invaded his space needlessly.

Ushijima was clean and quiet. His movements were slow but sure, and his stance stable and balanced. In his company Tobio didn’t have to worry about saying the wrong thing, or reacting the wrong way. Nothing was expected of him except his mere existence. Tobio could for the first time in his life just breathe in another’s vicinity without feeling like his lungs would burst from the exhastion.

He still couldn’t find it in himself to dress the way he used to. He’d long ago discarded the skirts, the crop tops and painted nails, the lip gloss and colors he enjoyed so much.

When he entered the scene as the man he’d been told to be he was surprised to notice the shift in the attention he received. Women started approaching him. At bars, in the park during his jog, in the grocery store by the shampoo isle. 

One of them asked about the faded scars on his hips—the ones hidden behind his boxer briefs—but he couldn’t tell her anything. Didn’t know  _what_ to say. How do you go about stripping yourself bare to the bone for the world to see? Where would you even start? To what end would you be willing to go for the other to get it, to sit in your melancholy with you every day? So he kept quiet, and focused instead on the glimmer of her necklace. The swell of her breasts. The curves to her hips.

But it would change. He knew it would.

And when the day came, it came in the form of an invitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: did you know that sex can and does often get used as a form of self harm? 
> 
> Anyways appreciate yourselves babes we all in it together 
> 
> LMK what you think uwu

**Author's Note:**

> I know I painted Tsukishima as the world's biggest asshole, but I swear I'll give more context to him and his actions. We're al flawed, and a lot of us are horrible, or did horrible things, and I'm not here to write another feel-good fic where the team is some sort of escape club where everyone is good and accepting. Nothing wrong with it, I just personally wanted to write something a little worse, a little closer to reality, because in a fucked up world like ours everyone won't be accepting. When even our own blood turns against us who's to say strangers and friends would feel any different?
> 
> I don't condone any of their actions, nor am I out to excuse them. I just wanna write some fucked up, brutally real people, because being queer kinda sucks, and also kinda rocks, and as you're finding the perfect balance inbetween you very often stumble into shit. 
> 
> Anyways, hope you enjoyed! Let me know what you think!! ^^  
> I still haven't decided the endgame ship, so if you have a good idea let me know, and tell me why that person in particular ;) I wanna know what you guys would like to see! 
> 
> And remember to drink water and sleep 8 hours at least and don't rush, there's no hurry.  
> xoxo


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